Earlier today, Verizon announced that — at least for now — they'll be offering unlimited data plans to its iPhone users for $30/month. But the question is: Do you need it?

Luckily, our siblings-in-arms at Consumer Reports have already done some pondering this question.

Without specifics on what Verizon's tiered data plans will cost, CR had to go on the assumption that the company will price those plans at the same or lower dollar amounts AT&T has been charging. Additionally, CR assumes that there is nothing about your average Verizon subscriber that would make him or her a bigger data hog than an AT&T subscriber.

What happened to their claims to attract switchers from AT&T - "we can handle the load" and "we'll offer unlimited data plan"?

The change, which applies only to new contracts, took effect Thursday, the same day Verizon began letting customers order an iPhone. Verizon executives had previously stressed the company was prepared to handle any surge in smartphone usage, thanks to heavy investment in its wireless network.

They added the "throttling" verbiage to the contract quietly without any announcement of the change, and deny any relation to the addition of iPhones to their network.

At the end of 2010, only 26% of Verizon's 94 million subscribers had smartphones.

To combat potential traffic jams, Verizon added language Thursday to its contract terms saying it may slow down connections for customers that fall in the top 5% of bandwidth use. For those users, Verizon said "we may reduce your data throughput speeds periodically for the remainder of your then current and immediately following billing cycle..."

Verizon said the throttling will only be applied in areas where a user is affecting surrounding customers.

Verizon Wireless spokesman Jeffrey Nelson said the introduction of the policy wasn't related to the debut of the iPhone. "This is clearly something we've been looking at for some time and introducing now," he said. "There's nothing magic about the timing."